Northgirls
by ForestLass
Summary: Arya comes back home with Gendry, she doesn't find only rubble... special guests: Lyanna Mormont, Wylla Manderly.
1. Shebear

"You alright?"

Gendry held the hand of the girl beside him. That contact made him shiver, her fingers were as cold as icicles.

Arya looked up to Winterfell: a pile of burned rubble and ruined towers were now the shape of her home.

It was hard, but she wouldn't go away, not when she had risked their life to come back, not when her home was so close.

"I don't know." Arya held back his warm hand. She couldn't lie to him, she didn't want to.

Gendry sighed, his frozen breath looked like a white mist, unable to cheer her up; to him, his home town was clustered houses, smelly streets, thick air. But Winterfell, to Arya, was her parents, her brothers, her sister, her past, her childhood.

Fresh snow and mud clung to their boots, making their climb more tiring, moreover cold winds from North slowed them down.

"Are you cold?" Arya asked, her nose and cheeks were bright red, but she looked fine with that harsh temperature.

"A bit." a slap of wind hit his face as his frozen jaw was aching. He was freezing to death.

"You're freezing to death." it sounded like a fact, not a question. She smiled and stopped, pulling him into her arms.

"Be patient, hold on. We'll be there in a bit and we'll rest and warm us." she was whispering, her face close to his. Her warm breath tickled his jawbone.

And then she rose on her toes to join their lips in a chaste kiss, a desperate touch, a dire need of him.

Their lips were burning like wildfire when that kiss became passion, desire, fire.

It lasted moments, minutes, hours, days… Gendry didn't know exactly, but when they divided, he felt like it was far too soon.

"Let's go."

Gendry nodded, smiling like a fool in love.

*

They arrived in front of what was left of the gate when the sun was setting behind the horizon.  
For a moment, Arya's eyes shone: the walls, once grey and impressive, were now black and jagged; the gate was burned, ruined; some towers were roofless.

"Have you seen? There are so many people."

From afar, they had seen smoke from the rubble and they have noticed footsteps in the snow; however they haven't figure that a hundred of people were deep in Winterfell's rebuilding.

"Ohi, you two."

Both turned their looks: Gendry raised a brow while Arya stilled immediately.

A young girl, probably as old as Arya, taller and wider than her, with broad shoulders and long dark hair, was staring at them. Her glance full of grudge, fury, pride and honour.

Gendry took a step forward, uncertain.

"Stop!" she warned him, unsheathing her sword. It was a long and wide sword, clearly heavy and well sharpened.

Arya touched her sword's hilt, staring at her. She looked at her as a wolf would stare a prey. She was studying her, she was looking for her weaknesses. She was still and lethal.

"I know what you want to do." the girl cried, lowering the blade, her eyes were slowly slipping from Arya to Gendry.

"You want to steal, to take something that doesn't belong to you. There's nothing left here, thieves already had sullied these rocks and these corpses. So, get out of here if you don't want to die. You need a place to have sex? The woods will be perfect for you. There's no room for thieves."

Arya turned her face towards Gendry, his cheeks as red as a shy maid's face.

"Are you a Stark? Is this your home town?" Arya's voice was husky, ailing.

"I am Lyanna Mormont, youngest daughter of Lady Maege of House Mormont. My mother and my sister fought for the King in the North and we sworn loyalty to him. Now I'm tired of our face, go away little beggar and stupid smith.-

"And what is a lady doing in this… place?" Arya asked, leaving the hand from the hilt.

"What you think? I'm protecting Winterfell. This is my last warning. Even if I'm a young lady, I have no fear to cut your heads off."

Arya took a step forward, determined to go in.

_Here we stand_, she thought as Lyanna was still in front of the gate. She knew she had to pay attention to her long sword and even a little error would cost her her head.

When Gendry's hand closed to her wrist, she was caught out.

The smith was pale and his blue eyes were wide open.

"Arry." he whispered, pulled her towards him. "We should go."

With a nod, he pointed over the armoured lady: three archers were focused on them.

"Afraid of arrows?"

However, Gendry was looking for something else. His eyes were on a huge beast with yellow eyes and black fur. It was the biggest wolf Gendry had ever seen.  
_A direwolf._ He thought, recalling Arya's stories about Nymeria and its brothers and sister.

She followed his glance and for the second time, she stilled her body.

"Don't meddle, alright?- Arya said, staring at the black beast.

In a while, the direwolf overtook Lady Mormont and it jumped on Arya, knocking her down.

Gendry was petrified as Lyanna was smiling.

"This is-" Lyanna started, but some laughter stopped her. Arya, covered by that giant wolf, was laughing like a child.  
"Shaggydog. Stop, please!"  
The direwolf was licking her face, the big black tail was waving happily and just for a while, Gendry thought it was a dog. Then he saw its big and sharpened white fangs and how close they were to Arya's throat.

Lyanna Mormont got close silently. Her sword held in her right hand but in her face there was no trace of dangerousness. She was surprised.

"Shaggydog?" a child's voice called the beast. The wolf glanced up and stared at a young boy with long auburn hair.

Arya sat on the ground, her eyes hesitating on Lyanna's sword.

_Bran_. She thought staring at the boy. _No, Bran should be about fourteen and he's just a child of nine._

"Rickon!" she cried, standing up.

"Arya!" he called, running toward her.

"Princess Arya, I'm so sorry to have insulted you… calling you beggar and thief and…"- Lady Lyanna's face was red, full of shame.

In that dining hall, all the men and women were together to have dinner. They'd sung chorus, they had made toasts to their lost princess and now Arya was free to relax with her brother and Lady Lyanna.

"… and about shagging in the woods. I'm speechless, I didn't kno-"

"Oh, that was funny. You brought a blush on Gendry's cheeks. He looked like an embarrassed silly lady." After some glasses of wine, Arya was very talkative.

She looked at him, set between two lord's bastards. A silly and happy smile was enlightening his face and his red cheeks suggested he was drank as well.

_There will be no moon or stars to spy on us, tonight_. She thought blushing.


	2. Mermaid

The sun was raising when Arya woke up.

She felt her eyes swollen, her back aching and her head was spinning. She had drunk the night before, she had drunk rum, a strong and dark liqueur from the Essos, a gift from that woman with a green braid and a funny accent, typical of the docks.

She vaguely remembered when she had stolen a jug of that spirit and when she had slipped out to reach the Forge, intrigued to give Gendry a taste of rum.

The man had drunk a glass of it in a sip, only to cough later and curse his foolishness.

Arya had taken a gulp too, sipping it more gingerly: the taste was good, sweet and odd. She had drunk it more and Gendry had followed her.

Arya blushed for what had happened when the jug was empty; she had thrown herself on Gendry to bite his neck. She wanted to taste his blood, to hear his groans.

"I feel hot." he had said and both their faces were burning.

Eagerly she had ripped his shirt and she had wandered her hands on his muscles, a hard contact on his warm skin.

Gendry hadn't stood still: his warm hands were touching everything, were pulling her clothes with the intent to rip the fabric.

And then they had kissed, stroked and bitten until they had been naked, their torn clothes were laying on the ground, and their skins were caressing each other, their breaths had been snarls and groans.

Arya blushed more at the sight of her ripped clothes, abandoned near her bed. She checked her waist and her sides: a scattering of light bruises were branding her pale skins. She wasn't upset, though. Since she had been back home, they hadn't had time or a chance to share that kind of experience. Three long months of glances and smiles.

She opened the window to feel the cold air in her bare skin, a shivering sensation against her hot body.

She missed Braavos: the hot and thick air, the noise of the canals, the thousands of foreign languages on the dock… her freedom. Yet now she couldn't think to live without that Northern wind, the stillness of the castle, the harsh accent of the Northmen.

Lying on the bed, bared and quite on the soft and piercing bear fur, she was getting back to sleep, when a knock on the door made her jump.

She quickly slid under the fur. "Who's there?"

"It's lady Wylla Manderly, my princess." the green haired woman replied.

She slid in Arya's room, laughing to catch her princess crouching under the fur.

"I'm sorry for this… invasion, but a nagging Ser is hunting me and I have no aim to be caught so easily." Arya grinned, staring at her red cheeks and her wrinkled gown.

"If my princess is embarrassed, I can leave you alone." she whispered, winking lightly.

"I'm not embarrassed." she hissed, throwing the fur away to look for a gown in her trunk.

Surely lady Wylla would see the bruises and the love bites in her body, but she didn't care.

"My princess, can I brush your hair?" Wylla asked, sitting near the big mirror taken from Sansa's room.

"Only if you stop calling me _my princess_." she replied, sitting beside the woman.

"As my lady commands." Arya cast her a sidelong glance, asking herself if she might have known something about her and Gendry.

Arya bit her lip, a habit she had found again while she was crossing the Narrow Sea, and she looked at the woman. Wylla's hands were warm, as warm as Gendry's, and in a moment she was in the ship again, the Narrow sea under her feet and her feelings back in her body.

Maybe the peace and the silence, probably her body still marked by Gendry, made her mind wandered to him, the moment when she had seen him again; she had been woken up by his warm hands, by his smell of man and sweat and smoke, by his bluntly words, by his painful sighs, by his tender eyes.

They had been hard times, Arya had reacted with anger at his sight.

_Ser Gendry of the Hollow Hill_, brawny and soiled, less happy and more mature, but still himself.

He hadn't lost his way, he still had been a stupid bull's head boy with his resolute look and his stubborn personality.

Not like her.

She had lost herself in a foreign continent, in a world full of death and blood. A dark blood which had stained indelibly her hands.

And she had hated him, because his hands had been hard and soiled, but under the water all the dirt could slip away. And he had smelled, but it hadn't been as rank as the death.

He was alive, warm, clean. She had hated him with all her heart.

She shouted it as well.

He hadn't been touched by her words and, with a weird look, he had taken her hands to kiss them, bite them, lick them.  
It had been a meaningful moment, almost sacred.  
When their eyes had met, Arya had felt light and she had asked to herself if something so alive, warm and clean would erase that blood, not so indelibly after all.

She stared at her hands, she knew Gendry had cleansed them in their precious night and she couldn't stop herself from smiling.

"Has your blacksmith appreciated the rum?"

Arya looked up to meet Lady Wylla's gaze. She was smiling.

"Yes." she whispered seriously, trying to hide her fear.

"Don't worry, Lady Arya. I won't say it to anybody."

And Arya believed her because her eyes were so bright and her hands were touching her hair in a familiar way.

"How did you-"

"I heard you. I was walking near the forge, in an attempt to avoid that nagging ser, when I heard your laugher. Then I heard an exchange of insults, and it was so tender, I couldn't stop you."

"Do you think someone knows about us?"

"I don't think so, or else Lady Lyanna would have gelded him."

"I don't allow anyone to touch or offend him. It's my own exclusive." she growled, sincerely angry. She was swift with her sword and darned reckless, she feared no one.

A light silence fell on them, both boned up on their thoughts.

"Thank you." Arya said, a light smile on her lips. "Rickon is back only because of you and your family."

"You should thank Lord Davos, he had crossed the Skagos to find him."

Another silence.

Arya stared at the green braid, it was a little ruffled.

"I heard you had a husband, once." Arya asked.

"Yes, once."

"The war?"

"No. I killed him." in her face a dark smile crooked her lips. There was sadness, no trace of remorse.

"My Lord grandfather had given me away to a Frey. It had to be a farce to gain favour with the Boltons and the Frey. But one of them had married me threatening my sister and my grandfather. Anyway, it was a really short wed. While he was sleeping, I stuck a knife on his throat and I fled in the North. I couldn't come back home, not until the return of the King in the North.

Sometimes I can hear the sound of his ripped throat and the smell of the blood in my hands."

Arya could feel the fingertips on her scalp. Lady Wylla was looking for a way to scrape her hands and, for the first time, Arya felt herself as clean as Gendry.


End file.
